What’s In A Name?

Since I’ve started this blog, I’ve had a handful of people comment on the name along with the content. At first I found it kind of funny that people commented on the name of my blog, after all, isn’t it the content that counts?

I’ll be honest, I may have done a little dance in my head when I thought of this blog name last fall. It’s nothing ground breaking, but I knew it was a keeper and purchased the domain name months before I even started blogging, lest someone else think of it too. I was actually shocked that it wasn’t in use yet. But truthfully, aside from including two of my passions, food and training, I never thought of it as a particularly inspirational or motivational phrase. Sickeningly clever? Yes. Inspirational, not so much. 🙂

But recently I got a few blog-name-specific compliments, and then I saw this little nugget. Mya really hit the nail right on the head here. Just as I apparently gave her a little bit of an Ah-HA! moment, she’s given me one as well. So I thought I’d take today to talk about what “I Train Therefore I Eat” really means for me personally, and what it can mean for all of you.

Why not “I Eat Therefore I Train”?

Because for me, that denotes a sense of “well I ate this much, now I have to work this much to negate it”. And I don’t find that to be a healthy mind set. (One of my biggest complaints about women’s magazines is when they tell you how many stairs you have to climb to work off that doughnut. It doesn’t work like that)

To me, I Train Therefore I Eat describes the idea that the food we eat is fuel for our training, for our lives. It’s not something that necessarily needs to be counted meticulously, in order to “work it off” later, but rather nutrients and energy that our body needs to perform optimally. The other component to this is that while food is extremely important, it’s not enough to just eat right and forget the rest (a set-it-and-forget-it kind of approach). Food and training (whatever that means to you) go hand in hand in my opinion, and are both essential to keeping you as healthy as you can be.

How does this apply to me personally?

I spent a good portion of my late teens/early adulthood using exercise (and other, much less healthy practices) to negate my unhealthy eating habits. I also used “health” foods, such as low-calorie and low-fat substitutions to negate my other unhealthy food choices. Meanwhile, I was denying my body the nutrients it needed to actually reach that healthy state I was striving for. Once I started viewing food as fuel for my body, instead of something I was constantly working against, I was able to use it to my advantage when it came to exercise and training.

How can you apply this to your life?

It’s not as simple as “realize that food is fuel”, because if it were that easy, there wouldn’t be lines at the McDonalds near my house at 10pm on a Tuesday. It’s a process, and it takes time. Figure out what fuel works best for your body. Figure out what makes you feel the best while you’re training, whether that be in the weight room or on the track. And “training” doesn’t have to be just working out when we’re thinking of it this way. (We’re training for life here, people!) Your body needs proper fuel just to function well in your daily life. It’s not just your muscles that need fuel, but your organs, your skin, your bones, your brain.

Bottom line: Food is fuel for optimal health. Stop viewing it as something to “work off later”, and see it as something to help what you’re doing later. Get you thorough that next lift. Get you through the end of your next 5k. Give you the energy to make it through a 10 hour work day. Whatever it is your body needs to do, use food as the fuel to allow it to do so.

Do you ever get comments on the name of your blog, rather than the content? Do you use exercise as an excuse to eat certain foods?

23 thoughts on “What’s In A Name?”

Before nights out with friends I use to get to the gym counting the calories to see which food I was going to allow myself : 800 calories, spring rolls at the chinese and cocktails… I don’t that anymore, my thinking is wholistic now. thanks for your blog and the link !

Thanks for your link as well!! I used to do that too, but it’s really not a healthy way to view food (not to mention that the body just doesn’t work like that). Glad to see that you have been able to turn your thinking around and use food in your favor!

Such a fantastic post!!! I wish more people would have your insight of seeing food as fuel! This was a huge factor in getting for me in getting past so unhealthy behaviors and fueling my body for the activities I aimed to complete on a daily basis!

All true. This is exactly what I want to emphasize to the field hockey team when I talk to them about nutrition. This is also a great paleo viewpoint 🙂 Our ancestors didn’t eat because they wanted to, they HAD to to survive, to have strength to go on their next hunt, and to reproduce. Good stuff as usual Steph!

Thanks Christina! I think this is a great point to try to get across to young athletes, especially young female athletes! And, you’ll be happy to know that I’ve been going more and more paleo-ish lately… we’ll see if I make the switch completely 🙂

I love this post! It also took me a long time to realize that exercise was not meant as a means to burn off the crappy food I ate. No matter how much you exercise, you can’t exercise your way out of a bad diet. Ever since I started to eat more whole, natural foods, I’ve noticed my skin is better, my energy has increased, and I just wake up feeling better everyday. I love your blog name – so creative and truthful of who you are as a blogger.

Thank you so much, that means a lot! I agree with you and I also say it often, you can’t out-train a bad diet! Food really has such a great effect on so many things as you mention, our skin, hair, energy, etc. etc., and many people don’t realize that there is SUCH a connection between what they eat and their overall health.

Great insight! It’s true, though – by just switching up those two words, you change the entire meaning. I found that the more I worked out, the more I became concerned with what I ate – that whole good fuel equals good workout realization. I think my blog name must have hit me in my sleep, because I literally woke up in the middle of the night with the words strong-fit-beautiful on my mind … and couldn’t get back to sleep until I made a note of my dream-induced inspiration. Thus the beginning…

Haha, I’m pretty sure something like that happened to me too… it just popped into my head and I wrote it down right away! But you’re absolutely right, eating the right foods definitely has a huge benefit when it comes to exercise and training!

I used to be exactly like that, in that I calculated every last calorie I had to burn off through running. Thankfully I’m now in the mindset of viewing food as fuel, and have been here for a good two years now. I get a lot of comments about my blog name too but that’s to be expected when your title isn’t something heinous like Kale, Cauliflower and Running! I don’t think either of our names are typical blog names, but that just makes us even more special 😉

BAAAAAAAABE best post you’ve ever written HANDS DOWN. And you’ve written many wonders 😉 I just want to SQUEEEEEEZE you and then talk to you for hours 🙂 I could talk to you for hours JUST on this topic! Anyways, amazing amazing amaaaazing post (again.)

I definitely USED to eat and feel like I needed to burn it off, but you know what? My life was CRAP then. Now, I eat and I train to FEEL good and keep healthy. Food comes first, then I will exercise and make sure my food is plentiful enough to fuel those activities!

Thank you Meg as always, for a very sweet comment!! You always know how to make my day! We should definitely skype soon, then we can talk all about this and anything else 🙂 Keep up with your philosophy of fueling your exercise and activities with the proper food, and you’ll be beasting those box jumps in no time 🙂 Thanks again, you make me smile!!

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Welcome!

Welcome to I Train Therefore I Eat! I'm Stephanie Rondeau MS, ATC, CSCS, CHC, and I'm a certified health coach and personal trainer in Boston, MA. My goal is to motivate and inspire, and to help people lead healthier, happier lives, free of food guilt and deprivation.I offer personal training, bootcamp classes, and health coaching services both locally and for distance clients. I hope you enjoy what you find here, and please feel free to contact me for more information on services. Welcome, and I hope you stick around for a while!